As is obvious, any bureaucracy as immense as the Imperium has an order to it. Status reports are the lifeblood of continuity and, of course, the interest of those seeking to root out problems. Regular status reports told of situation and needs, the lack-there-of told of invasion or insurrection. Clearly such communiqués should be safeguarded.

The reason why Zed is so very lucky is he happened to be wandering in deep space when one such message was wired back to Terra, but this one was not encrypted. Sent in the clear, the detailed document gave Septimus Quadraticus Sistema IV Alpha-VII Principale overseers everything they wanted to know about the planet, but it also gave their enemies every advantage, including of course its position.

All of this was possible because of one man who was just as little a man as Zed remained an ork, coincidentally. A servitor. He served on Forasev, seeing to the needs of the guard, repairing, filling in as the dutiful cog in the Imperial machine.